Viv rode on a fantasy Percheron, her chest against the back of a muscular lad, and regretted every second of it. It was now clear that he had not showered in a long, long while. She put her mask back on.

The armors had little glyphs on the pauldrons that she did not recognize, but she hypothesized that they protected their wearers against the excess black mana.

Actually...

[Baranese knight]

No, you dingus.

[Black-shielded light knight armor (enchanted): this poorly made armor was designed to equip soldiers deployed in the Dead Plains. It is shielded against the pervasive black mana and the legs have been reinforced to protect against revenant bites.]

Better.

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Specialized gear. That meant an organization dedicated to monitoring the dead lands and, possibly, SOPs to handle errant casters found there loaded with loot.

That was probably not great news.

On the other hand, the soldiers had been respectful. They had not leered. They had not laughed. She took it as an encouraging sign.

She quickly realized how the knights operated. Their blades were designed to smash into creatures and push them back without getting stuck in withered flesh. With enough strength, they could even cleave their targets in two, though they rarely bothered. She kept draining the odd revenant and her rider started to take the habit of pointing at targets for her with a grunt. He had an uncanny ability to tell when they would get in range and when they would be too slow to intercept them.

That was one other interesting thing. The undead detected the three knights from much further away than they had detected her. It probably meant that a large expedition could trigger a small zombie apocalypse.

Those guys knew what they were doing.

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The horses were indefatigable, probably due to the magical enhancement that pervaded everything in this world. They soon arrived at a small hill and the fort above it. There were no undead anywhere close.

Viv took a moment to appreciate her destination. The fort was old and it had seen some action. Successive garrisons had repaired the holes with stones, the patchwork result giving the edifice a ramshackle appearance despite its obvious sturdiness. The structure itself was simple. It had a single path leading up to a heavily reinforced gate. A circular wall surrounded several buildings with a single tower rising at the back. She was reminded of low middle age fortifications from her home country. She noticed a few sentries on the wall, each one wielding the same revenant-b-gone polearm. She would have to figure out how it was really called. None carried bows.

The place looked quite impregnable. Revenants would have trouble scaling the sheer walls even if they happened to be smart enough to do so. The defenders would merely have to push them away, and then light a fire down on occasion. It was a sweet setup.

A heavy grate was raised to let them in. Those were the thickest steel bars she had ever seen.

[Reinforced steel gates: those fortress gates can stop mundane battering rams for hours. Only powerful spells will breach them.]

They dismounted. She had to lower her head to pass and soon found herself in an inner court filled with buildings on all sides.

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As soon as she was through, the omnipresent black mana saturation faded, just like it had at the springs. It was good to be free of the stuff, even if she felt a kinship with the strange energy.

The court was not empty. She counted about ten men in uniforms milling about. They all stood dumbstruck as she came in, their eyes as wide as saucers.

There was not a woman in sight.

Viv knew the deal. Give an inch and they take a mile. She wore her war face and channeled Mouq inspecting a group of drunk dumbasses coming back from leave. It helped that, compared to them, she was quite tall.

The soldiers were a bit unimpressive. There was a ragged, bottom of the barrel quality to them that she could not quite define. They wore a leather cuirass over a green shirt and steel gauntlets, all of which looked like they had been put in service sometimes during the last decade. They also smelled a bit ripe.

Their short stature was not exactly natural. She had seen it before in the more remote corners of her area of operation, back in Afghanistan. These soldiers had been malnourished during their teenage years. It had stunted their growth.

The interior of the fort was clean, at least, so discipline was maintained.

The officer in charge screamed something she did not understand but probably went along the line of “are you donkeys certain you have nothing to do?” The inner court was deserted ten seconds later.

He turned to her.

“Food,” she said, precluding any negotiation.

His second translated her words with an amused smile. He pointed to a side door from which came an enticing smell. She started to leave, then stopped. She turned back to the sled, grabbed a squawking Arthur from her lair and carried the dragonette inside.

She found a small refectory that could feed around a dozen people at the time. A man in a stained apron was piling jerky in a basket at the back, next to a bubbling pot. A fresh loaf of bread waited nearby.

He froze when he saw her.

Her gaze met his. She calmly sat a squirming Arthur on a table and approached the man slowly, with a light smile. His mouth opened but no sounds came out.

She stopped in front of him, still smiling. She grabbed a piece of jerky and bit into it.

It was pretty good!

Removing the basket from his hands, she returned to the table. The cook crashed against a door on his way out.

You have gained the intimidation skill at Beginner 1